Thursday, 24 April 2014

This is my first post in a while, hopefully it's a good one. Enjoy my somewhat original take on the "pink-blue switch" liberals are always going on about.--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------IntroductionIn the
middle of the 1800s, parents began to dress their babies in pink and blue
coloured clothing as opposed to white clothing, but at that time the colour of
the clothing did not signify the child’s sex. In other words, both boys and
girls could wear either blue or pink clothing without being viciously bullied
for wearing the “wrong” colour. Around the time of World War I, the colours
pink and blue did begin to be associated with the child’s sex, but unlike the
parents of today, parents from that era were encouraged to dress boys in pink
clothing and girls in blue clothing. For some reason, these expectations were switched.
The switch took place around the time of World War II and from then on blue was
considered a “boys’ colour” and pink was considered a “girls’ colour.”

Therefore
gender is a totally random set of rules which have no political implications
and exist purely because mean people want to control people for the sake of controlling
people, right? At least, this is the impression you get when you listen
to university lectures given by liberals (who else should we expect to hear
from, right?) Since I’m sceptical of liberalism, I decided to look up the
“pink-blue switch”, as I termed it, for myself. According to this article, from the Smithsonian magazine, what my liberal lecturer said was accurate, but important details were left out. This is usually a more effective way to deceive people than
outright lying. Was my lecturer trying to deceive people? Or do liberals, given their
individualistic, anything-goes-ist worldview, simply fail to grasp the
significance of what they’re leaving out?* I’ll let you, the reader, be the
judge of that.

Has Gender Really Changed?

“Every generation
brings a new definition of masculinity and femininity...” or so the subtitle ofthe articlewould have us believe. While different countries, ethnic groups, political
movements and time periods have varying ideas about exactly what behaviours are
appropriate for males and what behaviours are appropriate for females, there
are certain continuities which are more interesting than any differences. We
humans are pattern seeking animals and (as much as liberals may try to stamp
such thinking out of us by insisting that the world is a super complex, incomprehensible,
meaningless mess) our ability to detect patterns is useful for understanding
the social world. See if you can spot the pattern here.

“The generally
accepted rule is pink for the boys, and blue for the girls. The reason is that
pink, being a more decided and stronger color, is more suitable for the boy,
while blue, which is more delicate and dainty, is prettier for the girl.”
According tothe article, this quote is from
an article published in Earnshaw's Infants' Department in 1918. It really
shows how society’s notions of masculinity and
femininity have drastically changed since then, NOT!

The quote states that
boys need a “decided” and “strong” colour, presumably because they themselves
are supposed to be “decided” (whatever that means) and strong, while girls are
supposed to be “delicate”, “dainty” and most importantly “pretty”. Has anything
really changed? Whoops, I forgot, back then girls were supposed to be pretty so
that they could let their future husbands know that they would make good decorations life partners, but nowadays girls are supposed to be pretty so
that they can let every guy around them know that they can bring them lots and
lots of sexual arousal using their bodies.

Anyhow, like I said,
the continuities are more interesting than the differences. Boys were encouraged
to be strong back then and they’re encouraged to be strong now. Girls were
encouraged to be delicate and pretty back then and they’re encouraged to be
delicate and pretty now. The “pink-blue switch” tells more about how the
meanings attributed to colours can change than about how masculinity and
femininity can change. For some reason people back then associated pink with
strength and blue with weakness and prettiness, but people today associate blue
with strength and pink with prettiness. The Political Significance of Gender

If the
“pink-blue switch” is the only argument liberals have as to why gender is a
fluid, random mess then I daresay that their viewpoint remains unproven for
now. So what is the alternative? Should we accept that masculinity and
femininity are simply natural products of genetics?

No, they are
creations of society (note that I use the word “creations” rather than
“constructions”, there is a reason for this which I may discuss in another
article.) Does that mean that they are random and meaningless? No. Masculinity
is a set of behaviours which enable those who are taught to adopt them
(male-bodied people) to rule over and dominate others. Femininity is a set of
behaviours which make those who are taught to adopt them (female-bodied people)
easier to dominate. Hence gender is a key mechanism through which the domination
of male-bodied people over female-bodied people is maintained. This is why
“strength” was considered a masculine characteristic in 1918 and is still
considered a masculine characteristic today. One must be “strong” in some form
or another (though not necessarily in a physical sense) in order to be
dominant.

Equality between male
and female bodied people cannot be achieved unless males stop behaving in a
dominant (masculine) manner and females stop behaving in a feminine
(subservient) manner (although I must stress that females should not be blamed
for their oppression.) This really ought to be obvious, but liberal academics
have a way of covering up the obvious with jargon about “fluidity” and
“essentialism” and other words which they throw at you without proper definitions.

Conformity and Indoctrination

What about those who
insist that they do not conform to masculinity or femininity, despite having
been raised to conform to one or other? Well, the less they conform to those
harmful ideals the better, but can one really be sure that they were totally
uninfluenced by years of indoctrination? In case you have not noticed, the
notion that male-bodied people should behave differently from female-bodied
people and vice versa is all over the place and it is especially prevalent in
things aimed at children. Films, televisions shows, books, video games, toys, toy
advertisements, sports, you name it, all these things contain highly repetitive
and highly consist messages about how boys and girls should be behave (although such messages are usually promoted in the form of “boys/girls
do behave this way.") Young minds, consistent messages, a huge amount of
repetition, if that is not indoctrination, then what is?

Of course we all
respond to this indoctrination in different ways and the degree to which it
sticks may well be shaped by the behaviour of our parents and other
individual-specific circumstances. Class and race may also play a role in
influencing the gender indoctrination process (for example, girls from poorer
families may receive less toys and thus be less thoroughly indoctrinated into
femininity), but can anyone who grew up in such an environment really claim to
be unaffected? I know I can't.

Conclusion

Does this mean that change is impossible? No, real change can happen,
but only if the culture is transformed and only if this transformation does
away with gender, the idea that male-bodied people should behave in one manner
(masculinity) while female bodied people behave in another manner (femininity)
and that it is acceptable for some people to behave in a dominant manner, while
other people are encouraged to submit to them. Masculinity and femininity may
take on different forms across different societies, but they have always been
anti-egalitarian ideals and equality between the sexes cannot be achieved until
gender is abolished.

*To be fair, thisJezebel article does include the quote which I discuss, but no significance is attributed to the pink = strong, blue = pretty idea. I think the quote was used only to show that people in the past really did associate pink with boys and blue with girls.---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------If you disagree feel free to leave comments, just try to be polite and original

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About Me

I am a radical leftist who does not belong to any political party or organisation (hence the name "Independent Radical.) The labels I use to describe my political ideology are "revolutionary socialist" and "communist". My political and philosophical views have also been influenced by radical feminism, the atheist movement, the sceptic movement, utilitarianism and virtue ethics. I do not claim to represent any of these movements, but I hope that those who identify with them will get something out of my blog.
I have no interest in appealing to liberal feminists, liberals in general, queer theorists, libertarians, post-modernists or anyone else who thinks that "anything goes" with regard to questions of objective reality or ethical behaviour. I am an unashamed truth-seeker and moralist. If that offends you, do not read my posts.